At G7 summit, Egypt’s Sissi urges Israel to abandon plans to capture more of Gaza

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi urges Israel to abandon its plan to take control of 70 percent of Gaza, as he attends the G7 summit in France.

Last month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the IDF to take control of more territory in the battered Gaza Strip, flouting the terms of a fragile ceasefire that took effect in October.

Under the deal, Israel is supposed to remain in control of just over 50% of the Strip, but Netanyahu said that troops today hold around 60% of the enclave, and are pushing toward 70%.

“Only 30% of the Strip is effectively left for the Palestinian people,” Sisi says at a G7 summit session on Middle East stability in the French resort of Evian.

This approach “must stop immediately,” he adds at the session, also attended by G7 and EU leaders, as well as the leaders of the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

Sisi says there is “no alternative to reaching a just and lasting settlement to the Palestinian cause based on the two-state solution” and urges “the implementation of US President Donald Trump’s plan for peace in the Gaza Strip.”

Egypt, which shares a border with Gaza, has been a key mediator between Israel and Hamas since the terror group’s October 7, 2023, attacks on Israel triggered the war in the enclave.

The first phase of the Gaza truce saw the release of the remaining hostages seized in the October 7 attacks, in exchange for Palestinians held by Israel.

The transition to the second phase, which was supposed to involve Hamas’s disarmament and a gradual withdrawal of the IDF, has been stalled for months as Hamas refuses to give up its weapons.